Amaleq13

You aren't sure why the setting of the meal was needed to push a new interpretation of the meal? Really?

Paul is describing a vision apparently provided by the Risen Christ that provides an Origin Myth for a new interpretation of a thanksgiving meal. In this vision, Jesus addresses an unidentified audience but it is ludicrous to suggest that every single Christian, from the first reading of this letter until today, doesn't understand it as being addressed to them. Jesus is speaking to all Christians from within this related vision of Paul's and there is no reason to suggest that, on any level, the message was restricted to other people in the vision. I think your inference requires an assumption of disciples for which there is no support in Paul.

Your interpretation ignores that this is a divine vision shared by Paul, ignores that it serves as an Origin Myth for the interpretation of the thanksgiving meal and pretends that Paul is describing something that actually happened. It is possible that Paul's vision featured other people besides Jesus but he doesn't tell us that and there is no reason to assume it given the apparent purpose of the vision.

I don't think you have to go that far but you might want to take your Gospel-colored glasses off if you really want to stick to Paul.

Where does the text say "after supper"?

It is my understanding, via Crossan, that Paul is complaining about certain people eating prior to the common meal. I took from that that the shared meal was not necessarily a complete meal.

You made it an issue when you claimed there was no need for the setting.

He is speaking of a particular meal (the thanksgiving meal as practiced by Christians) and relating a particular vision which provides a Myth to explain the Origin of the interpretation.

The content of the vision is the vision so I don't understand the differentiation you are making here. I think you are confusing (conflating) the narrative depiction of this myth in the Gospels with the vision related by Paul.

This is a poor analogy. You need to change the message to be relevant to an existing practice of remembrance within the community receiving the message.

If I was sharing this vision with a group of devoted followers of the Eternal JFK, I think they would be just as likely as Christians today to understand it as a message to them from their Beloved Jack about why they were remembering him as they did. That's the beauty of visions, Ben. They are not restricted by time. The Risen Christ can provide a vision set prior to his execution yet be speaking directly to Paul and his fellow Christians as well as to the centuries of Christians who would follow.

I think it is obvious that Jesus was speaking to all Christians who enacted the ritual in remembrance of their Sacrificed Savior and I also think it is obvious that there is absolutely nothing that requires us to assume that the vision involved other people gathered around Jesus. This is not to say that it could not but that there is nothing in Paul to suggest it. You have to go elsewhere (ie the Gospel stories) to obtain that information and I think that is precisely what you have done.

Perhaps I am mistaken but I suspect that anyone unfamiliar with the passage in Josephus would assume from your summary that their "opposition" was just like the opposition you identified as the most common to result in crucifixion. That it was a different sort of opposition altogether should be made clear since it is relevant to calling into question your assumed connection between crucifixion and messianic claimants.

Nothing in Paul's letters suggest the crucifixion was a problem for Christians that required a solution. It is a problem for others. We can imagine that it would have been a problem for any followers of the Incarnated Son but that clearly takes us out of Paul's letters and into the Gospels. Are you even aware that you are doing this? It is difficult to avoid even for someone who no longer has faith in Christianity.

Right, I guess that's why I thought it was obvious I was referring to the rest of your claim (ie "...he confided in other people at least some of what he was about.").

You're not sticking to Paul. The Heavenly Son certainly knew that a Messiah was promised but, if we stick to Paul, it seems he would be the Messiah once he took on the Form of Man, was executed, and raised.

Yes, I consider it absurd to treat a vision as though it were a memory. If we are sticking only to Paul, I consider it absurd to assume that Paul's divine vision which serves as an Origin Myth for an existing Christian ritual is describing what the Incarnated Form actually did prior to being executed.

Yes, since the message of the vision is being offered by Paul as a message to all Christians who were engaging in this ritual of remembrance.

Try imagining Jesus, in a vision, speaking to all Christians who were enacting this ritual of remembrance.

If you said it in a vision you had magically given me, no. I would know you were talking to me. If you said it in a vision you had magically given me and I was a member of a community which considered you worth remembering, I would know you were talking to all of us.

Only if you change it from a divine vision establishing a new interpretation of a thanksgiving ritual into a memory and I do not consider that transformation to be legitimate if we are sticking only to Paul.

Not after suggesting that we stick to Paul, no. I do not consider using the Gospels to understand Paul to be a legitimate effort.

Quite a few. Got any recommendations?

Amaleq13

I do not want to make unsubstantiated connections and it seems to me that you have to go outside of Paul to make the ones you make even though we were supposedly restricting ourselves to his letters.

I do as well but only if the evidence supporting those connections is reliable. In the context of our discussion, only if the evidence is found within Paul. That your "connections" require you to extract information from the Gospels violates both, IMO.

Notsri

Bruce Chilton briefly touches on this subject in the introduction to his translation of "Jonathan's" Targum to Isaiah. He notes several apparent correspondences between NT and Isaiah Targum readings.

(But, nota bene: Chilton considers the Isaiah Targum to be a composite work, placing its final redaction in an age long after Jesus and the NT authors; indeed, the bulk of the Targum's materials probably derive from Tannaitic (ca. 70-200 CE) and Amoraic sources (ca. 200-600 CE), much the same as the rest of Targum Jonathan. If he is correct in those conclusions, if the Targum does not stem singly from the Second Temple period, or at least prior to the second Jewish revolt, it would of course be anachronistic to speak of the NT authors using particularly our Isaiah Targum or our Targum Jonathan in general.)

Several of his examples:

The MT of Isaiah 6.10 has the phrase "return and be healed." The Targum ad loc. has instead, "return and it be forgiven them." In Mark 4.12 Jesus gives a very lose paraphrase of Isaiah 6.9-10, finishing with, "return and be forgiven."

Isaiah 66.24b, according to the MT: "Their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." The Targum ad loc. construes the verse in terms of those suffering in Gehenna: "For their breaths [sic] will not die and their fire shall not be quenched, and the wicked shall be judged in Gehenna until the righteous will say concerning them, 'We have seen enough.'" Mark 9 also links the verse's terminology with Gehenna (cf. especially 9.43, 45, 47, with v. 48 [which, also, is duplicated in vv. 44 and 46 in late mss.]).

The Targum to Isaiah 27.8 deviates considerably from the MT, saying: "With the measure you were measuring with they will measure to you, because you were sending away and distressing them, muttering against them in speech, becoming strong against them as a day of cursing." The opening clause, of course, calls to mind Mark 4.24 (and Matthew 7.2), where we find Jesus saying: "Take care what you listen to. By what measure you measure it will be measured to you; and more will be given you besides."

Less striking, in my opinion, is the possible connection between the Targum to Isaiah 50.11 and Matthew 26.52. Matthew: "Then Jesus said to him: 'Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword.'" The Targum: "Behold, all you who kindle a fire, who grasp a sword! Go, fall in the fire which you kindled and on the sword which you grasped! This you have from my Memra [Word]: you shall return to your stumbling."

Regards,
Notsri

Ben C Smith

Well, that explains it. We are using two different texts.

Here is 1 Corinthians 11.23-25:

[23] For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that [οτι] the Lord Jesus on the night in which he was delivered up took bread, [24] and when he had given thanks he broke it and said: This is my body which is for you; do this in remembrance of me. [25] In the same manner he also took the cup after supper [μετα το δειπνησαι], saying: This cup is the new covenant in my blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.

(Note for what follows: The passage does not claim to have been given in a vision or direct revelation of some kind. You and I have been assuming that for the sake of argument, which is fine, since it is something I have been toying with for a while. But just so we both know that we have already taken an interpretive step just to get that far.)

From this passage alone (not from the gospels, not from a vision of my own ) we learn that Paul received information about a particular meal on a particular night. Paul tells us that on that particular night Jesus took bread and told persons to remember him. On that night after the meal Jesus took a cup in the same way and told persons to remember him as often as they repeat these actions. In other words, Jesus was not alone on that night; he had somebody to talk to, both during and after the meal.

We infer from the injunction to repeat these actions and from the corporate context in Paul that his words also apply to later persons who share in the rite. That is an inference on our part, and I think a valid and obvious one; I also think it is an inference which most Christians through the ages have made. What is not an inference is that Jesus was talking to somebody in the second person plural over supper on the night in which he was delivered up. That is a hard datum from the text.

Paul does not say that Jesus spoke to him or to anybody else in this vision or revelation. Rather, he says that he (Paul) has learned (through the vision or revelation) that Jesus spoke certain words over supper on a particular night in his life. The speaking of those words, according to our text, occurred in history on an identifiable night. Paul himself may have heard Jesus actually say those words too in his vision or revelation. We do not know for sure, because Paul does not say. What he does say is that he has received the information that Jesus spoke those words over supper on that historic night.

Color me confused. Here is the exchange:

Which notion? If the first one (Jesus knew he was messianic, according to Paul), we had agreed on that. If the second one (he confided in others), I did not say it was found in various places. I said it was found in 1 Corinthians 11.23-25.

As for Antiochus Epiphanes, the Jews were crucified (according to Josephus) for defying his orders to worship his gods and sacrifice swine on his altars. They were crucified (according to Josephus) for opposing and resisting Antiochus, for breaking his laws. Why this should be a controversial statement escapes me.

And the connection between crucifixion and messianic claimants is not direct; the Romans could not have cared less why any given rebel was resisting Roman rule. The point is that a crucified messiah makes perfect sense in a Roman world as indicating a crucified rebel against Rome.

Ben.

Lógos Sokratikós

Actually, there is no hard evidence to the exsitence of more than 97% of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire. This demonstrates that the Mediterranean basin at the time was largely empty. Voilá.

<inflammatory comment deleted>

jakejonesiv

Justin's argument, First Apology ch 4, that Christians are unjustly accused because of their name, makes no sense unless the name being condemned is Chrestian.

Jake Jones IV

Amaleq13

Apparently so. I was relying on Young's which has:

"In like manner also the cup after the supping..."

This seemed to me to refer to drinking from the cup (ie supping = sipping) but I see from the Blue Letter Bible that it is derived from "supper".

I still don't see how you go from the apparent fact that no "supper" was part of the vision to the conclusion that Paul left it out.

IMO, you have not been assuming this to be a vision but oral tradition that goes back to someone present. That is the only way your inferences can be justified.

Given that Paul never met the living Jesus, I think it is the most obvious interpretation. The word apo simply cannot bear the weight of the assumption that Paul is passing on an oral tradition he obtained from someone who was present at an actual meal. It makes it possible but no more. If you could somehow establish that to be true, your inference of others being present would be justified, IMO. But only if you could establish that. Taken as a divine revelation, it is, IMO, not a justified assumption and I think I can help you understand why not if you will indulge me a bit.

Assuming it is a divine revelation from the Risen Christ, why was it given to Paul?

jakejonesiv

97% of what? How can you calculate a percentage if you don't know the total number of people? This comment makes no sense.

Jake

No Robots

I'm trying to get hold of a copy of the apology in Greek. It'll have to wait 'til I get up to the University. I have seen on the web where one guy says that wherever Justin says "Christian" it has been inserted by scribes over the original "Chrestian". Because there is only one manuscript of Justin dating from the 14th century, it is really not possible to overcome such suspicion. It's an interesting question, and I have enjoyed trying to fathom it.

Amaleq13

My mistake. I thought the "various places" applied to both.

There is a significant difference between armed opposition and opposing an order to abandon your religion by continuing to practice it. As I said, given ignorance of the actual passage, your summary implied that their opposition was like all the others (ie the former).

And an Incarnated Son getting crucified for continuing to worship the god of Judaism seems to make perfect sense in a Pauline world. You appear to be trying to understand Paul from an approach of identifying history behind his beliefs while I am simply trying to understand Paul's beliefs based solely on what Paul tells us.